Report on Loch Creran to Loch Leven Walk

 

On Saturday, 26th April, 32 hardy souls assembled at the Forestry Commission’s car park at Elleric, ready to embark on the rigorous

7 mile plus trek across the hills to Loch Leven. The party were following in the footsteps of the parishioners of Appin who, many years ago, would regularly make the same journey to St John’s Episcopal Church, Ballachulish.

 

This Walk was a partnership event, jointly organised by the Friends of St John’s and the Forestry Commission, as part of the former’s ongoing campaign to raise funds to restore the church & site.

Walkers came from Inverness-shire, the Central Belt and from all over Argyll.  A holidaying couple from Belgium also joined the party.

 

A member of St John’s Cathedral Choir, Oban, Irene Main, completed the Walk for the second time in a week!  Alisdair Campbell, a Server at St Andrew’s, Fort William, with MacInnes connections to Glencoe/Ballachulish and who has recorded every gravestone inscription, many elaborately decorated on slate from the local quarry, in the old Cemetery, was thrilled to be taking part to walk in his forefathers’ steps (but not so when it came to the river crossing!).

St Bride’s, Onich, was represented by John Lee and St John’s by former Head Forester & extremely fit septuagenarian, John Boustead.  Rev Rice’s wife, Fiona & Elspeth, wife of Bishop Martin, were welcome participants.

 

Despite torrential rain at the start, the weather forecast was to prove reliable and the party were to enjoy lunch at the top of the ‘Bealach’. From here you can see Glen Duror and the path to Tigh Seamus a’Ghlinne (house of James of the Glen) – the two Friends (organisers of the Walk) being direct descendants of this brave and unfortunate man.  Every year, on the second Sunday in November, Psalm 35 was sung in Gaelic in St John’s  - the same Psalm that James Stewart recited on the gallows at Ballachulish Ferry.  This is a custom, that it is hoped to revive. 

 

In the distance, the snow-covered summit of Beinn Neamh (1344m, the mountain near to heaven) and the formidable peaks of Glen Coe with the iconic Sgur na Ciche (Pap of Glencoe) by now a guide and featured on the Walk Poster along with the church beside Loch Liobhan advertising the Event.  Few people are unaware of the Massacre in this Highland Glen and the Clan buried on Eilean Munda (St Munda’s Isle), now within a few miles of seeing.  In St John’s churchyard are buried, amongst others, Donald MacDonald, a native of Glencoe and, according to his obituary, paternally in direct line with the survivors of February, 1692.  Nearby, Sergeant-Major John MacDonald, MBE, MC, DCM and his son Major Alistair Stewart MacDonald, MM, “one of the three”, who during World War 11 escaped from the Germans and evaded re-capture by speaking in their native language, Gaelic.

 

 Under blue skies and bathed in glorious sunshine, the walkers moved downhill along the  Aibhne (River) Laroch – in former times a boundary (to the East, the lands of the MacDonalds and to the west, Stewarts) into Baile a’Chaolais, (the village on the narrows), famous for its slate.   Piper John MacCallum piped them back into the grounds of ‘The Episcopal Mother Church’, hence the reason it was situated outwith the village. Here, “new” Friends were able to see the Appine Chalice, which was used to give the local clansmen (Stewart, MacDonald, MacInnes, MacColl, MacIntryre, MacLaren et al) their Viaticum before the Battle of Culloden, where over 70% of Jacobite troops were Episcopalian.

 

While the church stands on Stewart land, the MacInnes surname predominated in the area.  Look upon the gravestones on Eilean Munda & St John’s burial ground to see the prevalence of MacInnes graves.  It is for this reason, that Friends of St John’s hope to invite Clan MacInnes on 19th July 2009 during the Highland Homecoming celebrations to a Gaelic Service & Historical Talk.

 

 Members of the congregation provided well-earned refreshments.

 The Forestry Commission’s Evaluations reported very positive remarks and Friends were pleased that the Walk had generated so much goodwill.  Everyone agreed that the venture had been enjoyable, as well as productive, raising as it did over £800 for the Restoration Appeal of this important Highland church and Jacobite Site.

 

“O nach robh mi thall sa’ghleann a’ fuireach,

  O nach robh mi thall an glean Bhaile Chaoil,

 Nan robh mise thall sa’ ghleann a’ fuireach,

Chan fh’gainn e tuille, glean lurach mo ghaoil.”

(Composed by John Cameron of Ballachulish, who went to work at Coats Mills

 & became known as the Paisley Bard)

 

www.forestry.gov.uk/scotland               FC Events Guide 2008 Argyll

www.st-johns-church-ballachulish.com

www.argyllandtheisles.org.uk/ballachulish

 

HISTORICAL NOTE:

On 8th July 1770 over 400 people were confirmed by Robert Forbes, Bishop of Ross, outside the Storehouse, given to the congregation, some hundred years before the present church was built, by John Stewart, Laird of Ballachulish House.  A member of a loyal Jacobite family.   During the Penal Laws it was against the law for more than four people to meet together for worship.  People in the past met secretly in the woods & caves, with lookouts posted to warn them of approaching soldiers from An Gearasdan  (Fort William).

The following families & others walked from the Glen Creran area to St John’s:

MacColl = 26       Stewart = 13

 On 26th April, 2008 one MacColl & 3 Stewart/MacInnes were in the group,

 that retraced their steps.